No Such Thing as Good and Evil

Shade growled a primal growl while his eyes, tail, and horns rapidly flashed between red and black as he tried to maintain composure while he took in the sights in front of him. Eventually, he gave in to his anger, and his eyes locked into the cold abyss like black.

After having found a staircase that led up from the basement, he had wandered through a couple rather empty hallways. He peeked into a few rooms that were attached to the hall but found nothing of note. The rooms were completely barren outside of beds, if you could call them that. The beds were wooden pallets nailed together on the floor with various shirts and pants they most likely took from their captors being knitted together to make sheets and blankets. There were no rugs, chairs or even dressers and cabinets. He guessed these were the servants’ rooms and now having seen what he was seeing, he knew they were the servants’ rooms. He imagined they were built so close to the basement door as a reminder to the ’lucky’ ones that they could be treated even worse. But what he saw now was not much better.

After exiting the hallway, he had entered into what appeared to be a commons room of the building. It was a large room, with couches and tables thrown about. But the standard furniture wasn’t the main issue. The room looked like the interior of a cliché BDSM club, except the occupants inside weren’t willing participants with slave kinks, they were actual slaves. Almost all the furniture was made up out of, or had a feature using a still living dragon. The glass top of the glass tables in the room were on top of dragons roped and folded over in a V. The footstools besides some couches and chairs were just dragons chained up on all fours. There was a ‘dart’ board on one of the walls, except it was just a dragon with various different scores painted onto its body, and instead of darts, they were using spears and lances, some still sticking out of the dragon right now with a pool of blood on the floor. They must have been in the middle of a game when Shade sent his clones to the eastern gate.

Even the non-furniture was made from dragons. On the ceiling was a make shift fan, spinning to circulate the air, but the blades were made from what looked like freshly cut dragon wings. It appeared as if they replaced the blades with new wings frequently, which would normally be a hassle, but they most likely just had another dragon do it for them. The cutlery on the table was made from carved dragon bones, and there were bowls with snacks in them made from dragon skulls. The room looked more like it belonged to an obsessed cult rather than being a base to a government backed organization.

“Who are you? What are you doing here?” In the center of the room were 6 kneeling dragons all next to one another in a short line, all collared and with the appendages cut off, but not being used as furniture. There were 3 male and 3 female, with the male who had spoken to him being in the center of the line. They were all naked, and had tallies carved into their skin by their lower halves. Shade slowly turned his attention away from the horrors of the room to the kneeling male dragon who had spoken. He slowly walked over to the wide-eyed dragon, before towering over him and peering into his panicked eyes.

“You seem rather worried for someone about to be saved.” Shade replied in a monotoned voice. He reached down to grab the collar, to overpower it and break it off, but the dragon ducked away.

“Saved?” The panicked man replied.” “You can’t save us. Do you know what they will do to us if we try to escape…please just…” The dragon couldn’t finish his sentence, as Shade had created a black scythe out of his echos and sliced the dragons head clean off, blood spurting from his neck and splashing onto the other dragons in the line, causing winces and gasps as his headless body collapsed to the floor.

Shade released his echos scythe causing it to disappear into mist as he turned his attention to the remaining five, who were now shaking in fear as they looked up at him with their blood covered faces. “You can either fear what they’ll do to you later, or fear what I’ll do to you right now.” None of the dragons said anything, and Shade took that as affirmation to continue. He one by one reached down and dumped his echos into their collars, causing them to overheat and fall off, all of the dragons wincing, and looking worried as he did so, but none dodging out of the way like the other had. When he finished, he looked across the line a few times trying to find which of them was the least nervous. He landed on a green female dragon, who was shaking like the rest, but not nearly as much. He looked down at her and tilted his head. “Did all the hunters go outside to defend against the attack, or are there still some inside the base.”

The dragon took a couple quick nervous breaths before responding. “I…I… don’t know, I think most of them went out… but some still may be in the base. It’s a big base… and we’re usually confined to this room.”

Shade calmly nodded, which only intensified the nervousness of the lined-up dragons. He then pointed at the hallway he had come from. “Go down there, to the basement. There's a dragon down there working on freeing the thousands of caged dragons. Help him, then come back up here and free all the dragons being used as furniture. I’ll go and find the hunters that went outside.” He went to turn and leave, but the dragon spoke back up, so he turned back to her.

“How do we free them? Most of us are weak, we can’t overpower the collars like you did. And what if the hunters come for us, or the commander?”

“The dragon down there said he knew where the keys were. If he lied, was wrong or there are more keys than he knows of, then just collect all the dragons in one place and I’ll come back for them later. If the hunters, or commander come down, then fight.”

“Fight?” The dragon replied in a panicked laugh. “You think if we could fight them, we would be here? We tried fighting them, and we lost, that’s why we’re here! If we fight them, we die.”

An evil smile slowly came across Shades face, as his razor-sharp teeth peered out of his maw and electricity began to crackle around him. He let the echos he normally hid out, enveloping the entire room in an ocean of dark power. “Last time you fought them, I wasn’t there. I’ll say it one more time, you can either be scared of what they’ll do to you later, or what I’ll do right now. What’s your choice?”

The dragon gulped as her breathing quickened even more under the weight of his echos. As she stared into his eyes, she came to the conclusion he was being completely serious. If she didn’t go down to the basement and help whoever was down there, he was going to kill her right here and now. Though his beheading of the other dragon should have already shown her that.

She shot to her feet and turned to the hallway. She nervously gestured for the other dragons to follow her lead, and after each of them took one last nervous look at Shade themselves, they all got to their feet and the group disappeared down the hall.

As they disappeared from the room in one direction, he could hear a pair of footsteps come running towards the room from the other. His releasing of his echos would draw the hunters towards him, but that was fine with him. He was going kill them all eventually, really all he had done was similar to drawing moths to a flame. He calmy walked over to the dragon being used as a dart board. To no one’s surprise, the male dragons ‘parts’ were being used as the bullseye, and someone had hit it. Shade grabbed the shaft, of the spear, and ripped it out. The dragon roared in pain and he shook violently in his bindings, but as he was wearing a gag, his screams were mostly muffled. “Oh, don’t be such a…” Shade began to say, but looked down at the javelin in his hand and realized the dragons’ parts had stayed on the javelin, having been torn right off. He then looked back to the now eunuch of a dragon that had blood pouring from its groin. Weirdly, this seemed to calm him down a bit, as his eyes turned back to the normal red. “Oh…well…at least you’re a dragon so it’ll grow back…probably.” He then looked back at the dragon’s spear at the end of his spear. “And maybe if you’re lucky it’ll grow back bigger, have you tried eating more bananas?”

From the other side of the room, a door swung open and two hunters came storming in. Both of them white wolves, a man and a woman, both wearing the now normal leather armor. Apparently metal armor was out of style these days for any non-knights.

The male was holding a steel scimitar and pointed it at Shade. “You’re the one all the power is coming from. I knew the attack on the gate was a ploy, but nobody believed me.” He then turned to the other wolf. “Caseline, go sound the alarm, I’ll delay him.”

The other wolf nodded, and turned back to the door, but before she could leave, Shade engulfed the spear in hells fire, and launched it at mach speed at the her. He didn’t throw it that fast to show off, but rather since the spear wasn’t made out of special materials, it would melt under the intense heat of hellfire, and he wanted to make sure it got to the wolf before that happened.

The spear ripped through the air like the air was getting out of the way, and plowed through the wolf, then through the wall behind her, lighting her on fire as it passed through her body like it was paper. The fire though didn’t ultimately matter, the spear had shot right through her heart, killing her almost instantly. Shade then panicked for a moment. He looked down at his own chest nervously, in his prior angry state he had already forgotten about the enchantment that reflects damage. But after a few beats, nothing happened, and he sighed in relief.

He looked back over at the still alive wolf and his former companion, now a pile of ash. The wolf was looking in shock at the remains of his former compatriot who had instantly became dust, then slowly turned to Shade. “Who are you? What are you?” He said with wide eyed fear.

“Me?” Shade replied as he reached for, and grabbed another spear out of the dragon cosplaying as a dart board, this one from his right pec. The dragon once again groaned in pain, but not nearly as much this time. “I’m no one special, just a delivery man.”

“A delivery man?”

“Yes, and I’m here to deliver death.” Shade responded, as he once again enveloped his spear in flame, reared back and shot the spear through the air, right through the man’s chest. The man, like his partner, fell dead, disintegrating into ash. He once again looked down at his chest to see if anything would happen, but nothing did. He decided that going forward he would only use weapons made from echos. He had a running theory, the enchantment only seemed to double physical damage, and his theory was that even if the echos weapons seemed to do physical damage, since they were made from echos, maybe it wouldn’t count. He wanted to test it out on Faylen, but she wouldn’t let him stab her, the wimp. As he was thinking about this, he could hear a sound coming from the dragon dart board next to him, he wasn’t sure, but it sounded like the dragon was saying ‘Booooo’.

He turned to the dragon, and ripped out the gag. “Does the dart board have something to say?”

“Yes, actually. Deliver death? That was the cringiest thing I’ve ever….” The dragon began to reply, but Shade shoved the gag back into his mouth.

He then turned and started walking over to the ash piles while mumbling to himself. “Everyone’s a critic, huh. Just trying to have some fun while I kill scores of people, but no, that’s not allowed.” He got to the ash piles, reached down into them and took out their souls, eating them. He then turned and pointed at the dragon, not like the dragon could see it through his blindfold. “I’m saving you last!” He proclaimed, then went through the door the pair of hunters had come from.

The door led to another long hallway. He began peering into the various rooms and found unlike the rooms from before, these weren’t as empty. He found the kitchen, which he went into to raid. The chefs he found were once again kneeling and collared dragons. He set them free on the condition they told him where the alcohol was.

After he had freed the dragons from their bindings and the hunters of their booze, he went to the next room. It was some sort of library, with thousands of books in it. He set it on fire. Not because he hated books, reading or learning, but because his goal was to destroy this place, and books burnt really well. He stood and watched the library slowly burn, the only person who was in it was a female orc who was apparently the librarian. She ran over to the door to try to escape, but Shade picked her up with one hand and threw her back into the middle of the inferno like a ball. He waited for a few minutes expecting somebody to come and check to see what was happening, but nobody did. Since he had used hellfire, within five minutes the whole room turned to ash. He closed his eyes and sensed the soul of the orc, then made his way through the now ashy beach that was once a library. He reached down into one ash pile and grabbed the orcs soul. As a librarian, her soul wouldn’t likely give him much, if any power, but he still ate it anyway, because fuck her.

He then looked around the smokey and empty room, not a soul in sight, literally. He shrugged at the lack of attention the hunters seemed to give to their library burning down, so he moved on to the next room. This one was a large bathroom, with multiple stalls and showers. At the center of the male bathroom were 3 naked and kneeling female dragons. They were holding towels and appeared their jobs were to help clean and service the men as they showered. There were also 6 other female dragons chained to the walls with large metal circlets in their mouths forcefully keeping them wide open. He tried not to think about what they used them for, but deep down, he knew. He uncollared the 3 kneeling dragons, and left the others to be saved later. He then went to the female bathroom and found 3 kneeling male dragons, who he then uncollared. One of them seemed to suggest Shade go into the closed stalls, but he was worried as to what he would find, and left it to them to take care of.

He then found himself in an indoor training yard. To nobody’s surprise at this point, the training dummies were tied up dragons. He then found a medical room, where he killed all the doctors and non-dragon nurses. The dragon nurses were female dragons who were actually wearing clothes, albeit sexy nurse outfits.

He went into room after room, but all he found were either auxiliaries to the hunters, or enslaved dragons, but no actual hunters. He pondered what was going on, where were they all? Finally, he got to the door at the very end of the hall and swung it open, then entered what appeared to be a throne room. Apparently, the exterior of the building looking like a castle wasn’t just for show, they really built it like it was a castle for a king. The room was massive, at least the size of a large house. There were dozens of banners hanging from the ceiling with some sort of crest combined with the dragon hunter logo. There was the cliché red velvet carpet that led all the way from the wooden gate at the front of the room, to the purple velvet chair at the back. But why build a fake throne room? The dragon he had met downstairs did tell him that the commander had rainbow wings. But it couldn’t be a king or queen, that wouldn’t make sense? Maybe a prince or princess who wants to feel like a king or queen?

Ultimately, that didn’t matter of course right now, as this was exactly what he was looking for. Within the throne room were a dozen or so hunters who all seemed to have personal dragon servants as squires. The servants were drying sweat off the hunters, some offering them refreshments, and others providing massages. They were also providing much needed medical attention to their masters, patching up gashes, cuts and even cauterizing amputations with their fire. Almost all off the hunters in the room were genuinely injured in some way, shape or form. There was still loud screaming coming from the other side of the closed gate, suggesting the fight was still going on. Not only that, but the laughing he had heard at first was long gone, now it was screams of terror, and yells for help. Maybe he made his clones too strong? But if that was the case, why didn’t they sound the alarm?

He ignored the thought for now, focusing on what, or more specifically who was in front of him. He looked out at the dozen or so hunters, none of them having noticed him yet, and decided he would make a scene, like usual. He took a deep breathe, then with a booming stage voice, announced his presence. “You thought the appetizer out there was tasty? Just wait until you see the main course!”

All the hunters who physically could turned their attention to Shade, while the dragons largely ignored him and continued doing what they were doing. One of the hunters, a white furred minotaur, shoved away his dragon squire and got to his feet, or more specifically, foot. He snarled at Shade with smoke coming from his snout, his leather armor torn to shreds, and he was missing his left leg. He had deep gashes all over his body, and his fur had a slight red tint to it, like it had been covered in blood so thick, that even after washing it off, some traces still remained. “First that fox freak, and now you.”

“Fox freak?” Shade tilted his head, genuinely confused as he looked at the injuries on the man. It looked like he was cut by a sword, a large one. But none of the copies had swords, could his clones make echo weapons? If not, what had they been fighting?

As if summoned, his answer to who the fox freak was, how the fighting outside was still going on, and why the alarm hadn’t been raised, all came at once. The wooden front gate exploded as the corpse of what was once a dragon hunter flew right through it. The body was so mangled and destroyed, Shade couldn’t even tell what species it once was. Then calmly walking through the now gaping hole in the gate came a half dragon, half wolf. He looked more like an anthropomorphic fox, then a wolf. His fur all black as the night, with crimson red eyes, crimson red scaled wings and two crimson horns coming from his head. He wore the golden armor of a knight commander, and wielded what looked like a large two-handed sword, but was vibrating while making a loud noise.

Shades eyes once again blinked between black and red as anger swelled inside of him while he stared coldly at his once companion’s arrival. He struggled to keep his anger at bay while he growled through gritted teeth. “Alexis.”